A bearing assembly of the above-mentioned type is disclosed in DE 602 09 752 T2(family member of US 2004/0189124). DE 10 2007 040 460 A1, U.S. Pat. No. 8,052,331 B2, DE 10 2006 007 012 A1, DE 965 774 B and WO 2008/116443 A1 show similar solutions. In the first reference, a structure of a bearing assembly is proposed, in which the roller bearing to be retained in the bearing support and especially its outer ring is affixed to the bearing support with lateral affixing plates. The two affixing plates are affixed to the bearing support with bolts and fixedly clamp the bearing outer ring to the bearing support. The bearing outer ring is thereby supported on its both sides by the affixing plates; at the same time, the plates are supported on the two end-side surfaces of the plate-shaped bearing support.
So that a static over-determination of the axial retention of the outer ring does not occur, the cooperating surfaces must be exactly tailored to each other. If this is not the case, the bearing can axially migrate despite the two retaining plates, which is not acceptable, because then the axial position of the outer ring relative to the bearing support is not defined in a precise manner. During operation of the assembly, this leads to louder noises and increased wear as a consequence of the not-defined position of a transmission shaft supported by the roller bearing.
It is therefore disadvantageous in the above-described, known solutions that a very high manufacturing effort must be incurred, which makes the manufacture of the bearing support cost-intensive.
Solutions are also known, in which the roller bearing and/or its outer ring is affixed to the bearing support only via a single retaining plate. However, it is disadvantageous that the retention of the bearing on the bearing support is not as stable as in the above-described, known solutions.